A few best practices for FEA users

September 4, 2003

Paul Dvorak

Engineering departments often keep a thick book handy that details the way things should be done. It's
the department's preferred operating procedures. In recent parlance, it's their best practices.

Double checking material

properties is a best
practice for FEA users.
One way to do so is
through MatWeb.com. It
provides free access to
material properties. The
results, for example, are from a search for plastics with coefficient of friction between 0.1 and
0.3. Picking on a material name in blue pulls up the values needed for an analysis.

Web-ready report
generation and real-time
collaboration tools help
FEA users communicate
with others for peer
reviews and throughout
the design process. A
Web-ready report
generated in Algor FEA software (lower right), was prepared to let a simulation expert review
and comment on the model and results before releasing results to engineering. Real-time
collaboration made it easy for design team members to discu

Departments to which FEA is more recent may not have yet established a set of best practices.
To jump-start that effort, Bob Williams, product manager at Algor Inc., Pittsburgh, makes these
suggestions:

Take formal training when getting started. "While many engineers might be able to teach
themselves to use different aspects of an FEA program, most engineers also benefit from
traditional classroom training and Web-based distance learning, especially new users," says
Williams. "There are techniques you'll learn in class you might not pick up on your own," he
adds. "Selecting the right material model and analysis types are examples. You may have
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extensive material data, but what material model should you choose? If you have piezoelectric
materials, how do you analyze their behavior?" Proper training provides the needed guidance.

One reason traditional training pays off is that easy-to-use FEA software lets users tackle
increasingly complex problems. "A training best practice is to bring a representative problem or
model to class. Seeing how people at other companies use the software is one benefit of
classroom training that self-study does not provide. Students leave class with a greater
appreciation for applying FEA to the design process," he says. For more training best
practices, see "Planning for FEA training" (Machine Design, May 8, 2003, pp. 48-50).

Calculate approximate results before building an FEA model. This best practice is a reality
check. "FEA is not a black box into which users place incorrect data and receive useful
information. Therefore, it's best to have some idea of how a model will behave beforehand,"
says Williams.

Another aspect of this best practice is to assemble a list of frequently used calculations or
methods that provide a double check of FEA results. "Expected results can also come from
prior experience and experiments," says Williams. "Remember, FEA is just one engineering
tool of many and does not replace experience and experiments," he adds. When used
properly, FEA is a powerful complementary tool.

Reduce CAD models to the minimum required detail. "CAD models can be enormous
because they often carry complete manufacturing information. Think first about what really
needs to be simulated. What is essential to the analysis? Most likely it is not the entire product.
For example, the CAD model of a circuit board may include a heat sink, screws with threads,
wires, and other details. These parts could be meshed with thousands of elements, but are
they necessary to the analysis? They may only complicate and slow down the required heat
transfer simulation," says Williams.

To handle large CAD models, FEA developers have added defeaturing tools to remove the
unnecessary details. However, Williams says the tools might never be used because it's so
easy to import entire models. "Just a little more time up front removing unnecessary details
saves time later on," he adds.

Think about all the environmental conditions that could affect the design. "Structural and
mechanical stress are not the only causes of product failure," Williams points out. "Consider
whether motion, heat transfer, fluid flow, and electrostatics will affect your design as well." FEA
software has made it easier to directly couple different analysis types so that engineers can
simulate a product's behavior when multiple physical phenomena interact.

Build and simulate complex conditions in steps. Before sitting down at the computer, break
the system into a series of models with increasing complexity. For instance, an engineer
designing a computer tape drive first modeled the tape in static tension, then modeled it
around one roller, then a second, and finally with motion. Each step let him improve the model
and build confidence in the final simulation's accuracy.

"Prove to yourself that you understand how to set up each model and that the smaller
simulations work," says Williams. "Starting with large models and complex analyses with lots of
loads and constraints usually leads to wondering why the results don't seem correct."

Double check material properties. "Loads and constraints are important, but materials are
crucial to a model's accuracy," says Williams. An online database such as MatWeb.com is an
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invaluable resource that provides free access to extensive material data. Be sure to check
material properties at the temperatures the actual product will experience, not just the standard
handbook values.

Check the selected material model as well. For instance, Mooney-Rivlin and Ogden work well
for rubber, and Drucker-Prager models concrete. There are many others.

Consider a range of loads and constraints instead of just one. "For instance, you may
have a 500-lb load acting on an object at a 50° angle. After building a model that simulates this
condition, go the extra step and add in two more loading scenarios, one at 400 lb and one at
600 lb as well as the 30 to 60° range."

Software has already begun automating steps that apply load ranges with the additional benefit
of sensitivity analyses, those that tell which components are most affected or sensitive to
loads. In the past, it was common practice to build safety factors into products to cover design
uncertainties. Today, knowing exactly how a product will perform throughout the operating
range becomes the safety factor.

Finally, conduct a peer review. Let a resident expert look over the model and results before
passing them on for engineering use. "Collaboration is an increasingly important part of the
design process because better products result from bringing more than one point of view to the
table." Web-ready report generation and real-time collaboration tools help FEA users
communicate with others throughout the design process.

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